BUSH VS. OBAMA FOREIGN POLICIES-80

Neither true liberals nor conservatives are apt to be particularly pleased with the conclusions I make in this essay. Yet, I have tried to be objective and fair in setting forth my conclusions based upon supportable facts. One could always find other “facts” to support their own opinions. Just keep in mind this is not an exhaustive limitless essay of dozens and dozens of pages, but a reasonably concise essay giving what I hope are the essential facts to buttress my positions. With Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, et al. it is not that they were liars (at least not more than other politicians), their faults were more serious than that. Even as respected an official at that time (Secretary of State in the Bush administration), Colin Powell, much to his later regret, reported to the UN that Saddam Hussein possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) because the intelligence services of several European countries, including Great Britain, Germany, France, and Russia, and the USA all said that was true. And why not? After all, Hussein used WMD on the Kurds, killing 100’s of them and he used them in the 8-year war with Iran. Also do not forget that the Israelis bombed and destroyed his nuclear facility before he could build a nuclear bomb. It turned out it was not true that he had WMD at that time, but as Hussein told one of his interrogators after he was captured, he wanted his enemies and potential enemies to believe that so they would be afraid of him. No, what those aforementioned Americans are guilty of is being too prone to go to war because of their ideology and, lets admit it, their ignorance in this matter. I am sure I have said this before, after 9/11 it was imperative that the USA invade Afghanistan because the Taliban were giving a safe haven to Osama ben Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and their merry band of cutthroats and of course the Taliban would not turn them over to the USA. The colossal mistake was in staying in Afghanistan after the Taliban were overthrown. The philosophy of Bush, et al was to “nation build” and bring democracy to those benighted people. How naïve, how misguided, how ignorant. Afghanistan, as well as Iraq, Syria, Libya, and several other Arab countries are tribal in their societal structure, are not easily changed, and often with disastrous results when it is attempted. Did Bush & company not know what happened when Great Britain invaded Afghanistan twice in the 19th century and when the Soviet Union tried that in the 20th century? To hear Cheney talk now it appears he has not learned that sad lesson and I wonder if Bush has not either. Other than being determined not to engage in any wars regardless of the consequence of inaction, it appears Barack Obama has not learned that lesson either. More on that later. The 2nd invasion of Iraq is more problematic. In hindsight it was clearly a huge mistake. The first invasion by G. H. W. Bush was appropriate and justified. Even if a case could be made for G. W. Bush in the 2nd invasion of Iraq, again he should have pulled all of our troops out after the overthrow of Hussein. Would chaos then have ensued? Perhaps, however certainly conditions could not have turned out worse than what has occurred now and without the loss of so much blood and treasure. Reportedly people in the Bush administration and possibly Bush himself talked to Bernard Lewis, one of the, if not the, most knowledgeable and wise Western expects on Muslims and the Middle East. Apparently they heard him, but did not listen to his advice. Based on what he has written over the years he clearly would not have counseled invading Muslim countries or at least strongly warned what the results could have been. How is Barack Obama doing as president in conducting foreign policy as regards to the Middle East and Muslim countries in general as well as with Russia? If Bush was a disaster, then Obama is equally if not more so. Why? Let me count the ways. President Obama would not support the Iranian people in 2009 when they were out in the streets and vociferously protesting against the theocratic and dictatorial Iranian government. There is no guarantee the government would have fallen even if the masses of protesting Iranians in the streets were strongly overtly and covertly supported by President Obama, but there was a chance that would happen. Given the attitude of the vast majority of pro Western young Iranians it is unlikely fundamental Islamic radicals would have ascended to power. Why did not Obama support the protestors? One is left with speculation, nevertheless, based upon his later statements and actions it seems more probable than not that Obama, considering himself the anti-Bush, was convinced he could talk and cajole the Iranians mullahs into giving up their nuclear bomb ambitions and drawing closer to Western ideals and philosophy. How deluded could Obama have been? How? Consider Obama still believes he can get a safe and sensible agreement with Iran not to develop nukes and a missile delivery system to use them. Anyone want to make a bet on that not happening? Much of the Islamic Middle East is in chaos with control of parts of Syria, Iraq, and Yemen by Islamic terrorists. Also threated by the Islamic terrorists are Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan, and of course Israel. What is the Obama policy to counter these threats? Essentially it is strongly worded speeches and convening conferences to talk some more about it. Except Obama adamantly and stubbornly refuses to call this terrorism what it really is: ISLAMIC terrorism. How illogical this refusal to call it Islamic is borne by the very names of the variegated terrorist organizations where the word Islamic is contained in some of their titles: ISIS (The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) or ISIL (The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) that are transliterations of the Arabic acronym DAESH. The ostensible reason is not to inflame peaceful Muslims around the world by using the word Islamic in connection to terrorism. This is as specious as the arguments for closing Gitmo and trying all Islamic terrorists in civilian courts. What these apologists leave out is that Islamic terrorists attacked us long before Gitmo was opened and before the USA invaded the Muslim countries of Afghanistan and Iraq. Remember there was 9/11 and before that the first attack on the Twin Towers in New York, the attack on the USS Cole, the attack on the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, and the attack on the USA Embassies in Kenya & Tanzania, to name the major ones. It is both silly and dangerous not to call this terrorism what it really is. The vast majority of peaceful Muslims know what is going on with these Islamic radicals and it is demeaning and patronizing to insult their intelligence. Obama does not want to confront ISIS and the other Islamic terrorists in any meaningful way other than using drones to kill a few of them and an extremely limited use of manned airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq. Why did Obama dither so long before attempting to arm the rebels in Syria before the Jihadi element became so strong there? And why is he still not seriously arming our friends the Kurdish fighters (Peshmerga) who would be even more of a force against ISIS if they received heavy weapons from us? The suspicion by many is that Obama is so enamored by Islam and Muslims that he just can not commit to an all out war against these Islamic terrorists although he really does know they are a small part, an admittedly perverted and evil part, of Islam. There is a photo showing Obama giving a one-finger (index finger, not middle finger) salute at the African-US Leaders Conference in Washington D.C. in August 2014 which seems authentic. This is the first time I had seem this photo which, obviously, had not been widely published by any of the news media or I would have seem it previously. I looked on the Internet and found many examples of photos of ISIS terrorists giving the same one-finger salute, supposedly meaning there is only one Supreme God and that is Allah. I don’t believe this is proof that Obama is a Muslim, but merely once again illustrates, if any more examples are necessary, how simpatico Obama is with Islam and Muslims. And certainly Obama would have known the meaning of that gesture if only from his boyhood years spent in Indonesia. Obama said when he was a child in Indonesia he heard the adhan/adzan, the Muslim call to prayer by the muezzin, and it was the sweetest music he had ever heard. I heard this same call to prayer hundreds of times in the years I was in Libya and it sounded to me as if the muezzin, poor fellow, was crying out in reaction to severe stomach pains. I guess Obama and I had a clear difference of perception, but then I am not a Muslim (just joking). Wait, Obama does have a new strategy. He is going to use social media to combat ISIS. The State Department and Home Land Security will send out thousands of “tweets” daily until ISIS cries uncle, lays down their arms, and abjectly gives up the fight. They will be “tweeted” into submission. How original and reassuring.